Washington State Increased Significantly Among Pregnant and Parenting Women

Marijuana use at exit from the Parent-Child Assistance Program (PCAP) increased significantly after marijuana legalization in WA

(December 13, 2017 – Alexandria, VA) – A new peer-reviewed study about to be published in the January 2018 issue of the Journal of Studies on Alcohol and Drugs found that marijuana use at exit from a 3-year case management intervention program for pregnant and parenting women increased significantly after marijuana legalization in Washington state.

“This study adds to the data we have about legalization driving up use and negatively impacting society,” said SAM President Kevin A. Sabet, Ph.D. “States should slow down and realize that their actions have real consequences, especially among populations highlighted in this study — parents and children.”

The researchers divided the study sample into two cohorts based on whether participants had completed the program before or after legalization.

Researchers reported the following results:

“Most study participants reported complete abstinence from alcohol and nonprescription drugs at program exit. Among those who were still using substances, women who completed the intervention after marijuana legalization were significantly more likely to report marijuana use at program exit compared with women who completed the intervention before marijuana legalization. Across both cohorts (pre- and post-legalization), we found a positive association of exit marijuana use with alcohol, illegal methadone, other opioids, amphetamines, and cocaine use; even when we controlled for historical period, the association with some of these substances with marijuana use remained evident. Independent of marijuana use, we saw increased use during the post-legalization period of alcohol, illicit methadone, and other opioids.”

The study concluded that “Women who were not abstinent from marijuana at program exit were likely to report use of other substances as well. Our study design demonstrates an association but does not allow us to conclude that marijuana use leads to other substance use among this sample of women with a history of polysubstance use.”

New Federal Data Show Legalized States’ Marijuana Use At Alarming Rates; Colorado Now Top State in US for First-Time Marijuana Users

Other legal states also show alarming increases in use

The average rate of regular teen marijuana use in the legalized states of Alaska, Colorado, Oregon, and Washington is 30% higher than the U.S. rate as a whole, according to new data from the National Survey on Drug Use and Health. Almost a third of all 18 to 25 year olds in legal states used marijuana in the past month, up from around one-fifth ten years ago.

New data released last week show Colorado as the top state in the Nation for first time marijuana users, and its rate of first time users has more than doubled in the last decade. In that state, use among people 18 and over has also skyrocketed, as well as use among young adults aged 18-25.

Use among 12-17 year olds is slightly higher than 10 years ago (though lower versus last year).

Monthly use has also gone up in Washington by 10% since last year, and in virtually all legal marijuana states since before legalization, among household residents 12 and older.

Young adult use skyrocketing

Of particular concern was the fact that the use rate among 18 to 25 year olds has increased across the board. In Colorado, almost half of young adults used marijuana at least once in the past year, up from 37% in 2005. Washington DC’s number is 51%, up from 30% in 2005 – representing a more than 50% increase in users. In Oregon, use is up in this category more than 10% versus last year, and it is up 50% in the past ten years.

Teen use still a concern

In Colorado, 7.6% of 12 to 17 year olds used marijuana in the past month in 2005-2006, compared to 9.1% currently. While that number is lower than in recent years, we do not know how many of these users are heavy users. National estimates have reported significant increases in the number of heavy marijuana users in the U.S. Medical marijuana became commercialized around 2009, and that is when use started to rise. In Oregon, youth monthly use is up since last year, and in Washington it is up since 2008-2009.

Adult use is a major problem

For adults, many of whom drive regularly and are in the U.S. workplace, marijuana use can be a public health and safety hazard. Adult monthly use has increased in Colorado and Oregon almost 40% since legalization, and yearly use has also increased across all legal states since laws have changed.

NEW POLL REPORTED IN WASHINGTON POST: Support for Legalization Falls When Voters Have More Choices

The proportion of Americans who express support for marijuana legalization in opinion polls has risen sharply over the past decade from the low 30s to as high as 60 percent. But a new poll shows that what Americans who support “marijuana legalization” actually want is more nuanced than it might appear.

The anti-legalization advocacy organization Smart Approaches to Marijuana (SAM) commissioned Emerson College pollsters to ask 600 registered voters in New York State about marijuana policy. The proportion who agreed that “the use of marijuana should be made legal for adults aged 21 and older” was 60 percent, virtually identical to the 62 percent who answered the same question affirmatively in a prior Emerson College poll of New York State voters commissioned by legalization advocacy organizations. Respondents don’t know the views of the organization that has commissioned the poll, so it is unsurprising that the results were so similar across polls despite the opposing views of their sponsors.

However, the SAM poll included a second question, which took into account the fact that New York State has already legalized medical marijuana and has removed criminal penalties for possessing small amounts of marijuana (a policy known as “decriminalization”). This more detailed question was “Knowing that personal marijuana possession is already decriminalized and medicalized in New York, which one of the following policies do you prefer?”

Given more options from which to choose, respondents’ support for legalization dropped by a third, from 60 percent to 40 percent. Apparently, some of the poll respondents who had previously expressed support for legalization assumed they were being asked about the legality of medical marijuana or of personal marijuana possession. The “60 percent support” was thus actually a mix of people who supported legalization and those who opposed it but wanted marijuana to be accessible to severely ill people, opposed criminal penalties for personal consumption, or both.

The influence of question wording is often overlooked when marijuana-related polls are discussed, but has been familiar to drug policy scholars for many years. In their 2001 book Drug War Heresies, Professors Rob MacCoun and Peter Reuter, noted that survey responses vary depending on whether full legalization, decriminalization and prohibition are all included as response alternatives, and that posing stark choices at the extremes might even understate the public’s support for more modest reform options.

Substantively, the New York data shows that a strong majority of voters do not want anyone arrested for using marijuana (i.e., they support either legalization or decriminalization) and do want sick people to have access to medical marijuana (i.e., they support either legalization or medical marijuana).

But full legalization – corporate farms, marijuana processing companies, advertising, lobbying and the like – is considered desirable by a minority of New York voters.

Consumption of alcohol, tobacco and illegal psychoactive substances, mainly cannabis, have increased in the last five years in Portugal, according to a study by the Intervention Service for Addictive Behaviours and Dependencies (SICAD).

“We have seen a rise in the prevalence of alcohol and tobacco consumption and of every illicit psychoactive substance (essentially affected by the weight of cannabis use in the population aged 15-74) between 2012 and 2016/17, according to the 4thNational Survey on the Use of Psychoactive Substances in the General Population, Portugal 2016/17.

The study focused on the use of legal psychoactive substance (alcohol, tobacco, sedatives, tranquilizers and/or hypnotics, and anabolic steroids), and illegal drugs (cannabis, ecstasy, amphetamines, cocaine, heroin, LSD, magic mushrooms and of new psychoactive substances), as well as gambling practices.

According to the study, alcohol consumption shows increases in lifetime prevalence, both among the total population (15-74 years) and among the young adult population (15-34 years), and among both men and women.

The study also saw an increase from 8.3% in 2012, to 10.2% in 2016/17, in the prevalence of illegal psychoactive substance use.

“These are the trends found for cannabis,” the most popular illegal substance, according to the provisional results of the study.

Compared to 2012, there is a later average onset age of consumption for alcohol, tobacco, drugs, amphetamines, heroin, LSD and hallucinogenic mushrooms.

“At this time, surprisingly little is known about the impacts of cannabis on the development of cancer in humans,” said Dr. Callaghan, the study’s lead author. “With Canada and other countries currently experimenting with the decriminalization or legalization of recreational cannabis use, it is critically important to understand the potential harms of this type of substance use.”

The results from the recent study, as well as three prior case-control studies in this area, suggest that cannabis use may facilitate later onset of testicular cancer.

“Our study is the first longitudinal study showing that cannabis use, as measured in late adolescence, is significantly associated with the subsequent development of testicular cancer. My hope is that these findings will help medical professionals, public health officials and cannabis users to more accurately assess the possible risks and benefits of cannabis use.”

Just weeks before recreational pot becomes legal in California, San Francisco public health officials have published a report on their best guesses for problems that could arise from widespread marijuana use, including abuse of the drug by young people and unforeseen health risks among adults.

The challenge, authors of the report noted, will be warning new users about the hazards of cannabis consumption — like the possibility of overdosing or driving under the influence — without straying into fearmongering…The report also discusses public health hazards associated with clustering pot dispensaries in certain neighborhoods; already, medical marijuana shops are largely located in lower-income areas with more black, Asian and Latino residents. But in interviews, public health officials said they make no recommendations on the issue and are leaving decisions about where dispensaries should be allowed to policymakers…Drug and public health experts praised the report, but some said it’s not strong enough in warning of possible hazards of regular marijuana consumption, including addiction. For more http://www.sfchronicle.com/bayarea/article/SF-report-weighs-health-risks-raised-by-legal-pot-12383530.php

Children at risk after Marijuana legalization

TORONTO, Nov. 17, 2017 /CNW/ - Ontario’s Pediatricians warned today that the upcoming legalization of marijuana poses potentially serious health risks for children and adolescents—and the province is not ready to cope. The Pediatricians Alliance of Ontario (PAO) noted that when Colorado legalized recreational marijuana in 2014, a children’s hospital saw a fourfold increase in the number of teenagers coming to emergency rooms or urgent care centres with marijuana intoxication.

While the government of Ontario proposes a public education campaign for young adults, it is equally important to warn children and their parents of the risks of marijuana use, said PAO President Dr. Hirotaka Yamashiro.

“The public needs to understand that marijuana use has been proven to cause serious damage to the developing brains of children,” said Dr. Yamashiro. ”Parents and caregivers should be taking precautions.”

The PAO is calling upon the Minister of Health to develop a targeted public education campaign on the effects of marijuana on children and also to commission studies to explore the impacts after legalization. As preeminent experts in children’s health, pediatricians are offering their assistance.

“I already regularly treat children with serious health problems because of marijuana use,” said Dr. Sharon Burey, a Windsor pediatrician and Vice President of PAO. “With legalization, many more kids may potentially be exposed in their homes.” For complete article Fighting For Children’s Brains!

Support for pot legalization in New York falls 20 percentage points when respondents are given choice of decriminalization

SAM Action-commissioned poll used same college pollster as Marijuana Policy Project and Drug Policy Alliance; finds support falls dramatically when New Yorkers are offered alternatives to legalization

(December 4, 2017 – New York, NY) – A new poll conducted by Emerson College, the same college that conducted a poll for pro-marijuana groups Marijuana Policy Project (MPP) and the Drug Policy Alliance (DPA) last week, found that support for legalization fell to 40% when given the choice of decriminalization, medical marijuana, or the full legalization of marijuana. This clarifies the poll conducted by MPP and DPA finding 60% support when simply given the choice of legalization or prohibition. The poll was paid for by SAM Action and reflects New Yorkers who voted in the 2016 presidential race.

“When New Yorkers are given a choice, the majority of voters reject pot legalization,” said Kevin Sabet, President of SAM Action. “This poll shows that even after asking voters the binary question of legalization or not — the way the MPP/DPA poll did — support for legalization sinks when they are given other choices. New Yorkers don’t want pot sales and commerce legalized; they prefer either decriminalization and/or medical marijuana. This teaches us that w hen deciding policy based on survey data more research is needed into public opinion — since the binary question might give inflated results for legalization.”

The poll was conducted by Emerson College for SAM Action among 600 voters in New York. The poll’s methods emulated the MPP/DPA poll so that both polls could be accurately compared. This is one of the first polls of its kind to ask about decriminalization, legalization, medical marijuana, and knowledge of the status quo.

“It’s one thing to decriminalize marijuana, it’s an entirely different thing to legalize an industry that has commercialized a drug that is devastating our kids and devastating whole communities,” said Sabet. “New Yorkers seem to already know that states like Colorado are suffering from the massive normalization and commercialization of this drug which has resulted in Colorado being the #1 state for youth drug use in the country. Kids are being expelled at higher rates, and more road deaths tied to pot have resulted since legalization.”

DRUG POLICY ALLIANCE PUSHES LEGALIZATION OF ALL DRUGS

The growth of the Drug Policy Alliance’s influence and emphasis on harm reduction contributes to the staggering increase in overdose deaths. DPA gets political mileage from using the term “war on drugs,” turning the phrase into a euphemism. However, the USA officially abandoned the term eight years ago, and then the death rate began to rise.

Drug Policy Alliance recently put out a paper on decriminalizing all drugs, a first step towards legalization of all drugs. This group often talks about Portugal as an example which is misleading, because Portugal never legalized drugs. Portugal decriminalized drugs while providing assessments and treatment. Although drug use initially went down under Portugal’s decriminalization policy, drug use has gone up recently.

Drug Policy Alliance uses “social justice” reasons to push for legalization of drugs, first through decriminalization. Although “social justice” is a vague term, which is hard to explain, the organization uses the term to make people feel they support racial equality by supporting marijuana legalization. For a variety of reasons, Parents Opposed to Pot strongly disagrees. For complete article Pot Brains Making Drug Policy – That’s gonna work – NOT!

The real story behind the thousands of British children groomed by drug gangs: ‘Everyone missed the warning signs’

by Sally Williams - The Telegraph (UK), December 2, 2017.

Gang culture in south London is very much linked to the drill rap scene.In August, London mayor Sadiq Khan urged YouTube to step up efforts to remove extreme content after it refused to take down four violent videos, showing gang members threatening rivals and describing how they would murder them, as rap music plays in the background. ‘He’d watch them repeatedly,’ says Sophia, ‘as though he was possessed, brainwashed almost. And one day, he said, “They’ve asked me to be in one of their videos.” And I said, “What do you mean?” Now we know it was part of the grooming process, to make him think he was going to be famous and make loads of money.’But there is also intimidation, she says. They use threats, make you worry about getting shot, being messed with, people hurting your family. The violence starts and never goes away.‘They carry guns,’ she says. And on 2 May, the phone rang. ‘It was his father. He said, “Is Lewis with you?” I said, “No. Why?” He said, “He went out last night and didn’t come back.” ‘I went straight to the police station and reported him missing. They said, “You normally have to wait 24 hours at least.” And I replied, “This is not normal.”’

The criminal underworld has a new tactic – to intimidate and terrify teenagers into running away from home to act as drug mules… The mothers they leave behind share the full story.

It all started in 2013. It still pains Sophia* that she didn’t fully see what was going on. But how could she have known? Her son Lewis was a sporty boy – liked playing football – but four years ago, he was caught by police trying to bury a large kitchen knife in the park. Lewis was 12. Sophia asked her son why.

‘He wouldn’t answer. He has never disclosed anything. He always says, “Because I want to.”’ What she didn’t realise was that Lewis was already following orders. All she could see was that her son was changing. He started having rages, angry outbursts, being disruptive in class. ‘I said, “Lewis, are you being bullied?” And he got very angry and upset.

“No, no, Mum, I’m not. Why would someone like me get bullied? I’m not a pussy, only pussies get bullied, why would I get bullied?” That was his way of saying yes, and he felt ashamed that he wasn’t tougher.’

In January of this year, Lewis was found with a machete in his rucksack in school. ‘That is when it spiralled out of control,’ says Sophia. ‘My son is not a violent boy, he is placid, quiet, caring, kind-hearted. He would do anything for anybody – and that is the problem.

‘His behaviour became very odd,’ she continues. One weekend at the end of April, he took a packet of condoms out of his rucksack. ‘I said, “What’s that? Have you got a girlfriend?”

He replied, “Some guys took me to the clinic the other day to get these.” I said, “What for?” And he didn’t answer me. Then he got really upset, went into a rage and started throwing things around the room. He said, “Mum, I’m going to run away, I can’t take any more.”’

Again, Sophia thought he must have been being bullied. But it was much more than that. ‘He wanted to get away from these people,’ she now realises. ‘But he couldn’t because they’d obviously threatened him.’ On 2 May, Lewis went missing. Three weeks later he was found with £600 in cash and 83 wraps of class A drugs in a crack den in Northampton, 70 miles away from home. He was 16. ‘He had been screaming out for help,’ Sophia says. ‘And everyone missed the warning signs.’

According to Home Office figures, 140,000 young people go missing in Britain every year. They disappear for a multitude of reasons: family conflict, addiction, financial breakdown, mental health issues. But in recent years, Missing People, one of the charities backed by the Telegraph in this year’s Christmas Appeal, has picked up on a previously under-reported group who go missing: children being groomed to traffic drugs.